Week 1 - May Low Carb Bootcamp - Off we go!

[BIWI]

Welcome everyone!

Here's the Spreadsheet of Fabulousness that the lovely Sayra creates and cares for. Come and confess all.

If you prefer, you can use the individual Weight Tracker, provided by MNHQ, which will open (I hope) tomorrow morning.

Please make sure that you know the rules, and that you know about the allowed veg - look at the tabs at the bottom of the spreadsheet - and think about printing them off so that you have them to hand

If you have any questions, obviously you can ask them here, but there's also a specific questions thread because the chat threads can move so quickly that questions can get missed.

Unfortunately I'm working pretty full on for the next three days, so won't be around very much - I'll try and check in as much as I can, but in reality I'm not going to be around very much until Thursday - apologies in advance.

Very good luck to you all

Thanks Nobody..I hadn't realised there was such a difference in the carb count of red/yellow peppers.I'll still be cooking with them but will give the red and orange bits to DH. Pays to read the spreadsheet properly. Good luck with the baking trial.

Trash and Camper thanks for advice. Will stop dairy tomorrow and see if this helps over the weekend. I have now 31/2 stone to lose so not close to goal. In fact this is the heaviest I have ever been even with DC 13 years ago. Yes I have dieted quite a lot but had been in the process of dumping sugar in the last few weeks. Stress not particularly my son has exams coming up but is at weekly boarding school so much if the stress is somewhat eliminated as I don't have to badger him to do revision etc. I do pretty well ignoring external diet saboteurs but when your own body can't get with system. I'm not going to give up so I'll have to work out what works for me . The big + is I've not eaten sugar/ wheat for 3 weeks. Sorry for this post - crap weather doesn't help!!!

FOUND you all!
I've been an idiot and fallen of the wagon for a few days (blaming birthday boozing shenanigans) but I'm back on it. Fasting till dinner with tea and coffee with plenty of coconut oil as my tummy is in uproar today.

I've just seen this doing the rounds on FB and thought it was quite appropriate for all of us here! Apologies if it's been done elsewhere.
www.change.org/p/jamie-oliver-needs-your-help-fighting-for-food-education-foodrevolutionday

yippee I am now in ketosis! I did start a day before this thread and I'm an old hand at this lark so if some of you aren't quite there yet don't worry!

My biggest challenge to staying in ketosis (as always) is that I am going out to a friend's for dinner tonight. As far as I know she's serving reasonably low-carb friendly food, in that the carbs will be separate so hopefully I will survive the night, but I am rubbish at turning down stuff that's been specially cooked for me - I feel so guilty and like I'm drawing attention to myself and I hate having to explain the whole way low carb works to people who just don't get it. It's quite a large dinner party though and I think it's mostly serve yourself buffet style, so hopefully I'll pull it off without drawing too much attention to myself or my plate.

And then there's the alcohol…..

I know from experience that too much will not only put me out of ketosis and make me pissed REALLY easily, but it will set me off on a carb binge that will take days to come back from. I am going to sip delicately at two glasses of red wine in between lots of glasses of water and hope my friends who know me too well no-one comments on it.

So far good today and nobody bought me chocolate for my birthday so all good. Mind you I have spent a large part of the day up trees uterly terrified for my life. hopeing the adrenaline might help a bit.

Sorry, what I meant to say was that I will be avoiding all obvious carbs like rice and bread and desserts but it might be tricky if there are hidden carbs, for example in sauces, or if the only veg available is a bit on the carby side.

I will do the best I can but I am not going to be rude and/or starve if it's not strictly Induction Phase friendly. What you really need in an ideal world are a full two weeks in your diary that are completely free so you can eat at home without any awkward interruptions or sabotage from well meaning friends to really get this underway properly, but that just ain't ever happening in my life.

Hi all - back from work trip - don't think I can face Smoked salmon for a while - it was that for breakfast every day

Lunch was the inside of sandwiches and dinner was a steak and salad each night. Major stress was not enough water

Stood on the scales and exactly the same as I was before leaving - I think American Airlines helped - there food is so awful I didn't eat anything on the way home.

Anyway super strict between now and Monday and hopefully no real damage done - so glad to be back to routine and structure!!

I feel like utter shit. I've got a headache of the century and feel like murdering a kitten for some peaches. Diet going well otherwise.

Breakfast- scrambled eggs with bacon
Lunch- boiled eggs, tuna and spinach salad
Dinner- roast chicken with salad

Water- 2L. Really can't drink more than 2.5 a day as it just makes me sick- be it tea or plain water.

Didn't have such a good day food wise yesterday, but I'd expected that.
Anyway, I'm loving the recipes above, keep thinking that I can't snack.. So it is good to see some suggestions!

Breakfast- Mushroom Omelette.
Lunch - Spag bol sauce with runner beans and cabbage
Snack - Tea with milk [no sugar, it wasn't too bad. ]
Drunk 2.5 litres of water today including 2 glasses of sparkling water.

Just had lunch so I think for dinner I'll have yoghurt with spinach and cucumber/olives.

dillite will you throw things at me if I suggest that more water will help the headache?

Water with sliced cucumber in is lovely, if anyone's struggling with the monotony of plain water. Nicked the idea from a posh spa

ewanh I will trow a 2L water bottle at you, yes.

Hey everyone

This thread is so good to have-knowing we are all going through the same things is really helping me, specially when everyone in the office was eating burger and chips at lunch...
I stepped on the cakes this morning and had lost 6lbs...I'm sure this is a mistake, that's not even possible.i dare not step back on until Monday.

Really really missing wine right now...

B: low card sausage cooked in oil, and scrambled egg with cheese.delouis Mayo.
L: tuna steak and salad with lots of spinach
D:roast chicken with broccoli (skin on chicken) lots of Delouis Mayo. Butter on veg.

I'm wondering if anyone has used grated parmesan as breadcrumbs.any good?

Ooo water with cucumber.

Today

B - scrambled eggs with avocado

L - leftover pulled pork and stock-braised cabbage (which was gorgeous, I'll post the recipe on the recipe thread)

D - Smoked mackerel, soft-boiled egg and artichoke salad. Also featuring kalamata olives, which I am currently deeply in love with.

S - posh pork scratchings and several coffees with almond milk

Apply stepped on cakes? hope it does not sound mean to point out typo but made me smile, something obviously on your mind ....

I made chicken fajitas and cauliflower tortillas for dinner for the 1st time.

It went down well. The 3 youngest dcs ate their tortillas anyway but fajitas were a bit too spicy for them. Dd1 ate it, which is the true test, what with being a complete nightmare with this woe. She prefers the usual; chips, pizza, burger etc. I am making her life hell apparently........

The recipes I used to follow.

fajitas

Cakes ha! Scales!

Mmmm cakes.

tortillas

sass they sound good. how many tortillas did you get out of a cauli? I have looked at making them or cauli wraps but recipe seems to yield small number per cauli, did you get enough out of 1? They are expensive here so like to make sure they stretch. Can you believe an organic one is $9.99? yes for one! non-organic are $5.99. I expect they are a pound in Morrisons

B - 2 scr eggs, cream, butter, cheese, mushrooms and kale in bacon fat, cuppa, coffee w cream
L - spinach, roasted aubergine etc, lamb & feta meatballs, cucumber, yogurt mint mayo dressing
D - will be courgetti (how did yours turn out heman?) with creamy clam and mushroom sauce and probably some kale or spinach too

Cauliflower tortillas? I think I'm in heaven. I had no idea that you could do that to cauliflower!

Apply the things we can do with cauliflowers... you must try cauli pizza, my DCs prefer it now, when I say we are having pizza or grilled cheese DS asks if it is the cauli type or the carb type bless him as he is hoping it is the cauli one

I paid 55p from our local spar lex

I used a full one instead of 3/4's but it was small. It made 6 so we had one each. We loaded them up with chicken, guacamole, salsa, sour cream and cheese, and they held well, but you can't fold them.

I ended up putting an extra egg in, as she mentioned it would be runny but not liquid, but mine was quite thick. I also pan fried like she said, but did it in butter. We just carried on eating the rest with romaine lettuce leaves.

Not organic obviously.